Here is the trouble with Maureen Dowd's brand of journalism

On Feb. 28, Mo writes a fawning love letter to Al Gore, stating, more or less, that the world would be better off had he won the presidency in 2000. And she wonders who "Goracle" blames, late at night, for the fact that people focused on all his flaws instead of his strengths. Naomi Wolff? Ralph Nader? Bob Shrum? The Clintons?
But not Maureen Dowd. Certainly not. By all means, no. Dowd, who belittled Gore as much as anyone during the campaign for his "wackadoo" beliefs on the internet, the environment, and eventually Iraq, and repeated over and over falsehoods about Love Canal, Father of the Internet, Alpha Male, now gets to pretend she never wrote any of that. And that it's a real shame that Gore can't focus on the future of this country because the Bush Family Cartel wants to drag us into the past.

Of course, when you cover campaigns like a high school popularity contest, or as though the outcome is as unimportant as the society pages, and then have a good laugh about it over your $15 springtinis, you get what you deserve, right?

Here is Media Matters, reviewing some of her past garbage about Gore.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200703010001

I'll post her column below, and just for fun, bold the most absurd parts.

The best ex-president who was never president could make one of the most interesting campaigns in American history even more interesting. Will he use his green moment on the red carpet in black tie to snag blue states and win the White House?

Only the Goracle knows the answer.

The man who was prescient on climate change, the Internet, terrorism and Iraq admitted that maybe his problem had been that he was too far ahead of the curve. He realized at a conference that â€œthere’re ideas that are mature, ideas that are maturing, ideas that are past their prime ... and a category called â€˜predawn.’

â€œAnd all of a sudden it hit me,â€ he told John Heilemann of New York magazine last year. â€œMost of my political career was spent investing in predawn ideas! I thought, Oh, that’s where I went wrong.â€

As Mr. Gore basked Sunday night in the adoration of Leo, Laurie David and the rest of the Hollywood hybrid-drivers, Democrats wondered: Is this chubby guy filling out the Ralph Lauren three-piece tuxedo a mature idea or an idea that’s past its prime?

With Hillary overproduced and Barack Obama an unfinished script, maybe it’s time to bring the former vice president out of turnaround.

Hillary’s henchmen try to prognosticate the Goracle’s future by looking at his waistline, according to Newsday; they think if he’s going to run, he’ll get back to fighting weight.

With her own talent for checking the weathervane, Hillary co-opted Mr. Gore’s eco-speak right after the Oscars, talking environment throughout upstate New York. Given his past competition with Hillary, Mr. Gore must have delighted in seeing his star rise in Hollywood as hers dimmed.

If he waits long enough to get into the race, all the usual-suspect-consultants will be booked — which would be a boon for Mr. Gore, since his Hessian strategists in 2000 made him soft-pedal the environment, the very issue that makes him seem most passionate and authentic. The same slides about feedback loops and the interconnectedness of weather patterns that made his image-makers yawn just won his movie an Academy Award.

But what’s going on in his head? Like Jeb Bush, Al Gore was the good son groomed by a famous pol to be president, only to have it snatched away by a black sheep who didn’t even know the name of the general running Pakistan (the same one he just sent Vice to try to push into line.) It must be excruciating not only to lose a presidency you’ve won because the Supreme Court turned partisan and stopped the vote, but to then watch the madness of King George and Tricky Dick II as they misled their way into serial catastrophes.

Even though Chickenhawk Cheney finally got close to combat in Afghanistan, his explosive brush with a suicide bomber has not served as a wake-up call about the danger of Osama bin Laden’s staying on the lam, and Afghanistan’s slipping back into the claws of the Taliban and Al Qaeda while we are shackled to Iraq.

A reporter asked Tony Snow yesterday what the attack on the Bagram Air Base that targeted the vice president and killed at least 23 people said about the Taliban’s strength. â€œI’m not sure it says anything,â€ he replied.

Mr. Gore must be pleased that he’s been vindicated on so many fronts, yet it still must rankle the Nobel Peace Prize nominee to hear the White House spouting such dangerous nonsense. He must sometimes imagine how much safer the world would be if he were president.

The Bush-Cheney years have been all about dragging the country into the past, getting back the presidential powers yanked away after Watergate, settling scores from Poppy Bush’s old war, and suppressing scientific and environmental advances. Instead of aiming for the stars, the greatest power on earth is bogged down in poorly navigated conflicts with ancient tribes and brutes in caves.

Surely the Goracle, an aficionado of futurism, must stew about all the time and money and good will that has been wasted with a Vietnam replay and a scolding social policy designed to expunge the Age of Aquarius.

When he’s finished Web surfing, tweaking his PowerPoint and BlackBerrying, what goes through his head? Does he blame himself? Does he blame the voting machines? Ralph Nader? Robert Shrum? Naomi Wolf? How about Bush Inc. and Clinton Inc.?

With the red carpet rolled up, the tux at the cleaner’s, and the gold statuette on the director’s mantle, not his, the Goracle is at his Nashville mansion, contemplating how to broker his next deal. Will he cast himself as the savior of the post-Bush era, or will the first Gore in the Oval Office be Karenna, mother of Oscar?

Why is it so easy now, that Gore has become popular again with an Oscar and a Nobel nomination, to believe we'd be better off with him rather than W? For someone soooo intelligent, that's a very simplistic view of our country, isn't it? Maybe we would have been better off with Perot, too.

Al Gore said last night that the time had come for a "final reckoning" with Iraq, describing the country as a "virulent threat in a class by itself" and suggesting that the United States should consider ways to oust Saddam Hussein.

The New York Times
Gore, Championing Bush, Calls For a 'Final Reckoning' With Iraq
February 13, 2002

Actually, it has been shown that press coverage was an absolute disgrace, but if the votes had been counted correctly, Gore would have won the electoral college, to go along with his popular vote win.
Let's not forget, it was the press coverage that ripped Gore for not having a home state, since you know he was raised in a DC apartment building. But the RNC spun into him living at the Ritz, when he didn't.
It was about that same time that Dowd wrote that Gore was so feminine he was "practically lactating."
The death of newspapers, when it happens, will be traced back to the 2000 election coverage. An absolute joke from start to finish.